Michael Cole is here, filling in for Tom Phillips for the next few weeks because Tom is supposedly “on assignment.” Uh-oh. Who did he sext about face-fucking this time?

OPENING SEGMENT- F*CKING AMAZING!
Daniel Bryan comes out to a huge reaction in his home state. He runs down the card, which includes Nattie, Lana, & Tamina vs. Becky, Naomi, & Charlotte, Roode vs. Ziggler, and “a very special announcement” from Jinder.
He starts to talk about how disappointed he is in Sami Zayn but Sami just cuts him off by coming out. Sami proceeded to cut an AMAZING promo on the fans, comparing himself to Dragon but basically blaming the fans for not cheering for him hard enough to make his talent undeniable to the people in charge like they did for Dragon. He took lots of little shots at Bryan’s injuries, and actually had the fans chanting “SAMI SUCKS!” by the end.
One thing that he did that I absolutely loved- and I’m not even sure he did if he did it on purpose or it just slipped out- was that while he was talking about how Daniel Bryan was the greatest performer of this generation, he referred to him as “Bryan” as if it was his first name. He wasn’t just talking to Daniel Bryan; he was talking to Bryan Danielson. Combined with Sami’s promo skills and what I’m sure were, at times, some very real emotions he was expressing, this might well have been the single most believable promo I’ve heard in WWE in a very long time.
Then he ended the promo by saying for everything Bryan sacrificed for the fans and for his career, all he did was end up as a “housewife.” This was a candidate for Promo of the Year.
Kevin Owens then came out to antagonized Bryan some more, calling him a hypocrite. Bryan recited some pretty forced dialogue about how Owens only cares about himself and has “infected” Sami with his “poisoned thinking.” Bryan said that Owens doesn’t like him because he does what is best for the fans rather than what is best for Kevin Owens, to which Owens responded by saying that when Bryan says “best for the fans” what he really means is “best for business” and that “Daniel Bryan is now The Authority.” Sami added that Bryan is a sellout, and thanked Owens for saving him from becoming like Bryan. They hugged, and Bryan walked off in disgust. Owens tried to taunt Bryan about it, but Bryan said that he was “going to find a couple of dudes to punch you guys in the face.”

There are two fans in front with signs that say “Stupid Idiot Section.” My first thought upon seeing them was “they do realize that Jericho hasn’t been on TV in months, right?” but then I realized that of course they don’t: They’re stupid idiots! That’s pretty next-level right there. Good thinking there, stupid idiots.

CHARLOTTE FLAIR, BECKY LYNCH, & NOAMI vs. NATLAYA, LANA, & TAMINA- 5.5/10
Carmella was on commentary, because I guess they’re worried we’ll all forget she exists if they don’t stick her on TV every week, even though she rarely does anything important. Naomi should fire whoever did her hair today.
This was a good little match for the time it got. Naomi was a good babyface in peril, and Lana is improving in the ring. Charlotte made Lana tap but then Nattie pulled her out of the ring and tried to attack her with a chair again but Charlotte nailed her with a superkick, picked up the chair, and chased Nattie away. GREAT!

FASHION FILES- they tried to do a Pulp Fiction parody. It was extremely dumb.

BARON CORBIN vs. SIN CARA- no rating, good segment
Before the match, Corbin asked the crowd if they wanted him to put his US Title on the line in this match so they all cheered and then he told them “too bad.” Good heel stuff. Sin Cara, having just been denied a title shot, managed to pick up a quick count-out victory over the champ, so now he should have earned one.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS THE USOS- The Usos were cutting an okay promo but then Gable & Shelton showed up and parodied The Usos’ usual promos in a really lame way and were total dicks to them, but somehow this all worked. It felt like a necessary ramping up of tension. Like I said, this sounds like something that should have been terrible and backwards, but for whatever reason it somehow worked.

THE BLUGEON BROTHERS ARE OUT IN THE WOODS- weird, and not in a good way, but holy sh*t did Rowan sound like The Undertaker to anyone else? Also, he needs to lose the sheep mask. I was kind of hoping they would destroy it with their war-hammers instead of destroying the camera for some POV shots.

JIDNER’S VISIT TO INDIA- wow. They actually made Jinder look like a big babyface star… which is what they want him to be, which just begs the question: “WHY IS HE A HEEL?!”

JINDER MAKES AN ANNOUNCEMENT ABOUT SURVIVOR SERIES- yes. He really challenged Brock Lesnar to a match at Survivor Series. For all the reasons we’ve already been over in the thread where this news was first broken, this is an idiotic move on many levels that can only either bury Smackdown (and Jinder) or hurt their eventual plans for Roman, and cannot possibly be considered anything other than a waste of a Brock match. The reaction of the crowd when Jinder said he was going to challenge Brock was an all too predictable combination of booing and groaning, because this is a terrible idea.

AJ STYLES CONFRONTS JINDER MAHAL- Now THIS is much better. They used Jinder’s comments to set up for the Brock challenge- that there was no one worthy left to face him on Smackdown- to set up AJ coming out and saying that he wanted a title shot. Jinder refused to give him one and insulted him a few times, so AJ attacked him and fought off Jinder as well as both Singh Brothers all by himself. I actually think AJ will probably be able to get a better match out of Jinder than either Orton or Nakamura did.

BRYAN & JINDER BACKSTAGE- funny. Jinder was great cowardly heel here, throwing his lackey under the bus to face AJ next week while Sunil, the lackey in question, was a great “in hopelessly over his head” lackey, not only being eager to defend Jinder’s honor against AJ but actually seeming to legitimately think he had even a snowball’s chance in hell of winning.

BOBBY ROODE vs. DOLPH ZIGGLER- 4.75/10
Now it’s Dolph who picks up the win while pulling the tights for illegal leverage.

AIDEN ENGLISH SINGS BACKSTAGE- he yells at two dorks for using their phone while he is singing. Then New Day show up and the losers party with New Day. New Day makes fun of English, who I have just now noticed looks disturbingly like Doctor Krieger right now. Then Rusev showed up and said “No more New Day. The only thing that matters now is Rusev Day!” New Day then gave a collective shrug and said “okay” and they started dancing while Woods played Rusev’s entrance theme on his trombone. Rusev was not amused, and declared that “Rusev Day is not a joke.” English started to sing about Rusev Day but Rusev quickly cut him off, saying “not the time.” Rusev is the Alexa Bliss! of Smackdown. There is no idiotic segment that he cannot somehow manage to save.

KEVIN OWENS & SAMI ZAYN vs. RANDY ORTON & SHINSUKE NAKAMURA- 7/10
The match was great, but I so badly wish they would have been able to go twenty-five minutes instead of fourteen. Sami Zayn pinned Randy Orton after a low blow and a Helluva Kick. Owens and Zayn then went backstage to rub their win in Daniel Bryan’s face, only to learn that Shane McMahon will be back next week. Then Owens & Zayn came back out to onto the stage to celebrate their win to cap off what has got to be the single most enjoyable episode of Smackdown since at least the Superstar Shakeup back in April. GIVE ME MORE OF THIS!

I almost feel from that whole AJ Styles and Jinder Mahal segment, from the challenging Brock Lesnar part and everything else, like it was some of exposure and somewhat showed that we shouldn't be taking Mahal seriously lol. From Cole saying "Are you kidding me", when he's challenging him, AJ profoundly telling him, "We're not in your country!", Graves saying "There's a difference between confident and delusional", the whole ridiculous over dramatic posturing right in AJ's face, it's almost like everything that was done was reveal the truth about him, at least they didn't really, in any way, seriously put over the idea of Mahal v Lesnar, lol.

It's a giant troll-AJ ends up winning the belt, which people would LOOOOOVVVVVEEEE at this point, then goes on to face Lesnar which is obviously the match people deserve lol.